Merck said that the Louisiana case is the first Vioxx lawsuit brought by a state attorney general to go to trial. The case was filed by the Louisiana Attorney General’s Office in 2005 in Louisiana state court.
Mr Fallon, in ruling for Merck, said: “The weight of the evidence indicates that Vioxx has gastrointestinal benefits as compared to traditional NSAIDs and Merck’s marketing of the gastrointestinal benefit is consistent with the conclusions of their clinical trials.”
Pertaining to the State’s argument that it would have restricted sales of Vioxx had it known more information, the Court observed that the State of Louisiana did not meet their burden of showing that they could and would have established an exclusive formulary and excluded Vioxx from it had the State known different information about the drug.
In contrary to this the Court said: “The record shows, in fact, that neither LDHH (Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals) nor any reasonable department of health and hospitals would have attempted to establish an exclusive Medicaid formulary for the sole purpose of cutting off reimbursements of Vioxx.”
Tarek Ismail, outside counsel for Merck, said: “We believe the evidence showed that Merck acted appropriately by labeling Vioxx under the direction of the FDA and according to the evolving science available at the time it was on the market.”
Bruce Kuhlik, executive vice president and general counsel of Merck, said: “We have maintained that we acted responsibly and communicated accurate information about the safety of Vioxx to physicians, patients and governmental authorities.”